A crazy day of excessive exercise and music

It might be Sunday but it has been a crazy mad day for physical exercise.  As if all the days of continuous sitting on my arse has effected my head and body, I just had to get out and walk.  So did two and a half hours of walking. Got back, had a cup of tea, then went out again on a forty minute bus ride to do some shopping. I had in  mind a nice winter coat for Layabout Lad.  Even though he works now, he still is lazy so I'll stick with this name.  The coat looks good and I know from previous years he just doesn't wrap himself up warm enough, so this would hopefully keep him dry and warm.  I returned home, had lunch, went to sleep for an hour and then got up again to see Layabout and his girlfriend for a few drinks and a catch up.  He and she seem to be very happy and have been enjoying a week off work together.  They have another week and I'm sure this will be good for them as well. It was so good to see them both so happy.  I felt happy as well, like it was contagious.

This evening some other madness has overtaken me. It has been listening to music on Youtube.  The thing about youtube is it makes suggestions based on what I'd already listened to.  These are good because they are similar genres, but they are are bad when three hours later you suddenly realise it's gone midnight and your eyes are feeling distinctly heavy.  It's the exercise catching up with me.  How on earth have I packed so much into one day?  Well, I haven't because it's now Monday. Shite.

Shop at Bluewater, no thanks I'm not genetically engineered

I have been in desperate need of a pair of boots to see the next winter through.  Inexplicably we have been dealt the terror of the last two or three years of very cold winter weather. In Scotland the snow drifts are piled up by lorries or rather snow plow converted vehicles on gently curved corners and are about as high as a double decker bus.  For weeks on end you walk on compacted snow because it just doesn't melt, and driving becomes a bare knuckle affair as it becomes compulsory to keep an eye out the window for the next Council gritter to come along.  Some cars parked outside houses get stuck.  There they wait until the snow melts or a determined individual spends a lot of time digging them out. Then of course there is always the worry about where do you shovel the snow you have already moved from your own drive. The only place it can go is in the neighbour's.  So getting a pair of boots was for me paramount, in consideration of the amount of walking I try to do.

My first choice was to visit a shopping complex called Bluewater, it is a retail park which got developed in an enormous chalk quarry.  Visiting it you are reminded of this as the complex is based in the bottom of this quarry with chalk faces and vegetation all around it. It is easy enough to get to especially if you have a car. There is also access by buses but these will take longer. A hell of a lot longer. There are three retail giants who put in the largest amount of finance into Blusterer being developed. House of Fraser, Marks and Sparks and lastly yet significantly John Lewis.  Together these three practically own the place.  However going to this complex was probably the worst choice I could of made. As I walked around and saw the over inflated prices and designer labels everywhere I found myself getting angry. It is a place for the ponces, the toffs, the people who have money to spend. For example, I saw a coat in an outdoor shop, it looked ideal for winter, the type of coat which would keep you warm regardless, keep the heat in, the cold out, the snow off and the rain away.  I saw the price tag, which was beyond justification to purchase. It is incidents like this which make me angry, it is almost like there is a different set of human beings who live in a different universe and also have a different set of genes. People who are not effected by the recession.  I could not in any sense of my mental faculty justify the purchase, although I had the means to, I just didn't have the motivation or snobbery.  It makes me wonder if these wonderful individuals actually have smelly shit. It also makes me think when will the revolution come? When will we rid ourselves of the obnoxious genetic freaks, what have we done to deserve them.

I went home after wasting a few hours and as I left the place made a mental vow I will never go there again, of if I do it will be on the guarantee of a bargain. The place should of stayed a quarry in my mind at least people would of had jobs out of it still and aggregates help to build the country. I got the buses back home and feeling tired slept for a couple of hours. On waking I thought of another place I could shop, not so far away and definitely not as pretentious as Bluewater.  It was then in a shop called Sports Direct I got the perfect pair of boots I had in mind.  At the price I expected to pay in the first place, perhaps one or two pounds cheaper even.  I was verified in my purchase not to be a genetically engineered super rich human being, I'd got a bargain, I was real, am real, am alive and got a sensible head on these shoulders. Lastly, yes my shit stinks just like anyone elses.  Although I wish it didn't. But hell, it is good to be a normalish human being. They also had a great line in coats at very reasonable prices as well. I'll be going out to check these out at another time. Possibly tomorrow.  After all, if you have dry feet you need warm pits as well.

Learning music and a healthy brain, but not for armchair sports fans

It has been thought exercising your brain somehow can make you brainier.  Some electronic games manufacturers also use this as a selling point. The more I think about it though the more I can't help but question how true it is.  I really don't believe people become brainier with age, they just learn more and relative to their age so their intelligence is steady.  However, I was intrigued to find an article about Mick Jagger starting up a new group called the Super Heavys on account all the musicians are famous, e.g. Joss Stone.  There's four of them, but the other musicians don't mean a thing to me,  I'm not good at knowing band members and their histories. Then in another on another tangent, curiosity led a search to find an article about life long musicians. It said they were more able to discern both music and voices in a crowded room, because a lifetime of experience had made their brain function to a point there was very little in the way of auditory perceptual degradation against much younger persons on similar tasks.  In a big jump the literature suggests studying and playing music prevent the ageing process, mentally of course.  I mean Micky looks what he is, 70th birthday this year. Old rich git, but a great musician.  One thing I am sure the research did not look at was the long term effect copious amounts of alcohol or recreational drugs had on the long term professional musicians.  They are not all like Sting, with pure bodies and into tantric sex yoga.  He's in better shape than me.  He'll be sure to live to 100, another old rich git for sure, but a great musician.

The thing is with all the cerebral challenges people can immerse themselves in you'd of thought our brains got bigger and we'd be a lot smarter, but it just is not the case. Not in any sense at all.

I'm presently learning the ukulele, it is my passion and my hobby.  Playing it takes up time each day and I love it.  In addition the research points out whatever you do it must be something which is participative.  Not like armchair football fanatics, who scream at TV sets and don't actually bother going outside of the front door to do any exercise. For some reason I don't think singing a footy song counts as music, but I'm sure it makes them happy.  It is a pet hate I have, football crazy men, who talk more passionately about the team they follow than their family, their wife, children or their pets.  Like football is everything and if you can't talk football then you are not a member of the club. You are not worth talking to.  I can't talk footy, I don't watch it unless it just happens to be on TV when I walk into the pub. But it means nothing to me.  In fact I can say I care more about my ukulele (Harvey) than I do any football game. Well unless it happens to be my country playing, but I'll sit down during the national anthem or better go to the toilet, which is always a good time to relieve oneself. 

Time, memory, a tune on the Uke and a rasp

Time is relative and it goes by very fast. I need to talk to my dentist about this as I'm well overdue a check up. However, with my mouth open and his arm down my throat it'll be difficult to discuss. It's been ages since my last blog, blooming ages. It feels like it. Outside of my window fireworks going off. Bright sparkles explode in the sky.  So what have I been doing with myself which keeps me from writing words?  Working. Simple as pie, and 1, 2, 3.  Working.  However, when I think about it I'm lazy to a large extent. On account of taking an  hour lunch break and actually using it for lunch rather than going to the shops to do things. Hell, I need new shoes and it would be productive to get some, but instead the heels and soles wear away because my belly says it wants food. However, my head has being saying I'm fed up with being fat and it is about time I felt more comfortable and lost some of it.  As usual it's always getting the motivation to do it. Not to mention the time as well.  It's bloody weird, I may have got to be a middle fish in the factory but there seems to be a hell of a lot of admin tasks I do.  It makes me think why on earth am I doing these things, there should be a clerical little fish to do them.  It's all bloody maintenance work.  Always on the go and always fire fighting. In one training session this week the trainer seemed to think private sector employees worked harder, I'm not so sure of that, and they soon found out this was not the case when the reflex response was voiced.  Have I ever said I hate accountants, on account of them only looking at finance and saying things like "we must get more done with less," for if they got paid less then the extra funds could be used to get extra fishes.  Something which I'm sure an accountant of any description would not even consider.  BANG. There goes another firework.

The last couple of weeks I have been completely infatuated with trying to learn and sing a song on my ukulele (Harvey).  It's by Asaf Avidan and is called "The Recogning Song." It is short and easy enough to sing, I like the rhythm and the notes they go well together.  It also kinds of strikes me how songs and music are sung to different melodies. Singing the words to a song is follows a different tune to the actual tune. This I think is probably true with a lot of songs.  Either that or I am completely stone deaf or is it tone deaf.  It's the age. When in fifties I didn't realise forgetting things would be as big a problem as it is.  I can walk from one room to anther and forget why I did it.  Go back to the original room, sit down, remember what I was about to do, then go into the second room again and forget.  You couldn't make a comedy out of it because people wouldn't believe it, but it is true, I'm losing my marbles.  They are just dropping out of my ear and going rolling down the street. Someone will be lucky enough to use them for something.  I just hope the new memory of Asaf's song stays in my head so I am able to sing it at some time, to someone.  It's odd but I'm even starting to get over the hysterical laughter as I play a tune on Harvey and sing the words. As Sparkling has told me before, it's a matter of getting both the tune and the words right and she's told me it's not working.  Well it's starting to get there now, even if I can't remember what is getting there, something bloody well is. I hope so anyway.

Little Baby J has given us her first raspberry.  I saw a video of it on Face-book.  It was wonderful, I must of watched it three or four times in a row and laughed so much, because she is really a very cheeky little girl. This stage of development isn't something I learnt about when I was studying psychology, which when I think of it could of been a bit more descriptive. But then the problem with psychologists is they are always trying to figure out what is going on in someone's head. Hell, it must be the hardest thing to think about when talking about a baby who can't talk, is teething and the best thing since sliced bread is being able to ween.  Baby J is so beautiful she has everyone around her little fingers.  She will never be short on love. Sparkling spent an entire day with her and told me how it tired her out in the end. But she really enjoyed every moment of it. Sparkling is the proudest Gaga there has ever been. She's also a naughty Gaga as Rock Chick has said she is not to feed Baby J chocolate, even if it happens to be a very small amount.  Awwe, poor Baby J.  I can't wait to see her again and see her smile and see if she will rasp at me.  Cheeky little monkey. 

Three IT problems

I'm having a bad IT day today. It has happened on three items, this computer which I write BLOGS on, a laptop computer which is used to while away hours in the pub and my new smart phone.  This computer just refused to switch on and work, it kept freezing in the Windows start up screen. Eventually it has re-booted but it doesn't look like good news because a new computer will likely mean I've got to get a new internet set up and go wireless.  My laptop would not connect to the internet in the pub, I turned it on and off at least three times but it would not connect on the browser. This has happened before and cuts short what would of been a relaxing doing very little time. Lastly my smart phone just decided to turn itself off and not turn on no matter how much I pressed the button. I thought maybe it had somehow ran out of charge. Which didn't make sense.  So I took the battery out, put it back in and it worked.  If bad luck comes in threes I'm about to have three lots of IT bad luck in the coming days or weeks. Though this may only actually be one, and it's the biggest one of all, this computer I use every day. Shite.  As the saying goes sometimes shite happens.